Wait For Me
by ewnovak
Summary: Season 4 Episode 12 deserved a different ending. Bea smith deserved to be happy.


She could feel it all now. The entirety of her being falling into place as the short lasting silence of her cell in H1 welcomed her new found warmth.

"Attention compound, attention compound. Count will commence in 10 minutes." The all too familiar voice rang through the speakers bringing Bea straight back to reality.

With a smile stretched across her lips and nothing but a red sheet wrapped around her, she lifted from the bed and walked toward the shared area.

"Bea, you look like a teenager." Liz commented with a tendered laugh.

"Allie here?" She retorted, a shy look of concern now raising on her reddened cheeks.

"She's gone to the showers. If you're gonna follow her love, you watch your back, yeah?"

"I'll be alright." She assures whilst returning to her cell.

After pulling on her teal uniform, she returns to sit on her bed. In a final attempt to settle the butterflies a short giggle escapes her lips as she starts to realize the magnitude of the effects the younger blonde has on her. She thinks of likeness and love and immediately shakes off idea, because for Bea love was something she'd never been lucky enough to experience and the thought of being that fond of another person had always been way too scary for her. With the thoughts of love pushed way far back into her head the smile returned to her lips as she left her cell and approached the showers.

"Allie?" She questioned as she pushed open the door to the shower block. The rooms silence started to burn into her skin as she quickly realized the noise of the shower was absent. There was nothing, no answer from allie, no running water not even a tiny clattering of someone messing around at the sink.

The room had 5 showers, each with the curtain drawn closed apart from the last. Realization struck as she ran to the corner of the fifth shower where her blonde girlfriend lay limp and propped up against the wall. Her arm exposed with a black band tied just above her elbow and an empty syringe on the floor. Bea felt sick, because only days before Allie had promised. She promised she was done and that she'd never do drugs again. Could she have possibly broken her promise so fast? With that another realization hit. The prison was emptied of drugs just days ago, and there was no way they could've gotten in so fast. Allie didn't do this to herself, and Bea was so sure of it that she dropped her towel off her shoulder and fell to the floor, pulling her girlfriends face into her hands.

"Allie, Allie. Wake up. Please wake up." Bea exclaimed whilst repeatedly pushing her hand against her beloved's face.

Allie wasn't waking up and Bea felt so stupid for not sharing the shower that she asked for not even half an hour before. She could see that there was nothing she could do for Allie now and without a second thought she stumbled up from her weak knees and pressed the red button on the shower block wall.

The panic alarm blared through the prison but Bea did not leave Allie's side. She kept telling her that it was going to be okay and that she just needed to hang in there as she ran alongside the stretcher her girlfriend lay so lifeless on. Bea could not bare the thought of leaving Allie alone like this and began to feel the insanity when Will stopped her from entering medical. She tried to explain that Allie wasn't using anymore and that it wasn't Allies fault, but no one apart from Bea believed that. She had never felt more useless to Allie than she did now, because her confident words that Allie was clean now even were full of doubt. The butterflies she felt before were now gone, and replaced with a volcano that was on the verge of exploding.

Upon Bea's return H1 was full off pacing and people trying to rationalize the situation but none of this could hide the fact that she believed she was to blame. Feeling ultimately responsible because she got too close to Allie and everyone Bea cared about was a target. The idea that Allie could've possibly done this to herself became so distant, as Bea and her friends started to rule out people who could've gave her a hot shot to get back at the redhead.

"See, it coulda been Tina. Y'know 'cause you lagged on her.. But, but no it weren't her 'cause I seen her in the visitors center so..." Jenkins offered trying to help find a reasonable explanation whilst just as quickly ruling another person off the list.

"Then it's Kaz, it's gotta be Kaz." Bea said almost as if she was trying to reassure herself that she had checked every possibility off the list and Kaz was the only one left that could possibly do this. Then it dawned that her girlfriend was in a very delicate state and with that idea alone she broke into a sob. "I just can't lose her," she said in a final attempt to show how desperate she was that Allie had to survive this, that the young female was a reason for her to stick around. Even being pulled into an embrace from her best friend Maxine couldn't warm her blood up enough to be open to any idea that a world without Allie was one she could exist in.

Bea tried to sit in her cell and wait but the idea of doing absolutely nothing became too much. In desperate attempts she ran through the prison looking for any officer to give her some information. The slight shift in the air as she ran through the prison felt overpowering for her weak body. She felt like her ribs were about to crack and her heart was going to fall onto the floor at any given moment.

"Mr Jackson. How's Allie?"

"She's critical but stable."

"I need to see the governor I.. I want to go to the hospital. " Bea tried with Will, knowing that usually she could reason with him and get something she wanted.

"Bea you know that's not going to happen." He replied whilst registering the look of complete loss on her face. He knew this was more, more than just friends. "So its true, you guys together?" He asked with a shy voice, close enough to sounding like he didn't really want to hear the answer. So when Bea replied with even more desperation than before when she told him that Allie wouldn't do this and that he should check the CCTV he felt completely defeated. For once, there was nothing more Will could do for Bea and he didn't like that as much as she did.

Hope was dissipating from every limb of Bea's body as the shock horror and reality of the events started to set in. She began to feel numb until she spotted Kaz talking to Smiles. Bea had been angry before but this was a different type of anger, this one was filled with a complete and utter need for instant justice for what had happened to her girlfriend. She had been angry before but never like this. Never had she felt anger for her significant other on quite a level like this one.

Fuelled with anger she walked, right into Kaz's block and into her cell. She waited and waited with fists full of anticipation. So when Kaz opened the door to her own cell Bea jumped. She kicked and she punched because she was so mad and Kaz was the only person that could've hurt her Allie. Kaz did this, Kaz hurt Allie. Be was so blinded with a love infused anger that she couldn't stop. It took a blow to her head as she fell to the floor for her to register Kaz's screams. The room quickly became full of words and before they both knew it Bea had accused Kaz of attempting to kill Allie because she didn't want her or Bea to be happy.

"You are fucking insane. I never touched her... I love her too" she confessed as they both fell into a sob. Becoming quickly understanding that they were part of a game way bigger than just the both of their angers against each other. There was a dimension to this story that neither of them had seen before until now. So they cried, because they both love the young blonde and Bea had gotten it so wrong and neither of them had any idea what to do.

With cuts and bruises and a visit to medical later, Bea found herself again repeating to Vera what she earlier told Will. That Allie didn't OD. That Allie had been given a hot shot. That Allie had promised her and she believed her. But no matter how many times Bea did repeat herself, no matter who she repeated herself to, there was nothing anyone could do. Allie was attacked, and now she was alone in a hospital bed, and Bea could feel the life being sucked out of her just as it was her girlfriend.

Bea stayed awake all night, staring blankly around the medical room. She found some comfort in the idea of herself in a hospital bed whilst Allie lay in another. There was the anger infused sadness, then the loneliness, the desperation and the tears followed and then came the sadness again. The irritation grew with the desperation to see her girlfriend, to kiss her forehead really softly even if it would be the last time. The last time she'd kiss Allie. It sent shivers and then the pain replicated tsunami tides of devastation as they ripped through her chest and her head of red hair repeatedly fell into her hands. She missed Allie so much, and she didn't even know whether she was gone yet.

There was just no way she could wrap her head around how this had happened. She'd watched the moon fall and the sun rise and neither of the events brought more clarification to what happened to Allie. Her trail of thought was directed onto another when she watched Ferguson walk past the windows of medical.

With a smirk plastered across her face she popped her head round the door and spoke. "My condolences about Allie. Let's call her... collateral damage?"

There was no delay in the volcanic eruption in Bea's chest. Her heartbeat pulsated through each and every vein as she screamed through the glass of the door she had just watched Ferguson walkthrough. Bea had thought she couldn't possibly get angrier than what she did the day before with Kaz but she was wrong. Her screams became borderline psychotic as she was dragged back to medical and her left hand cuffed to the bed. She was angry, and irritated as she now knew what happened to Allie. If there was anything that would make the situation worse, it would be that this happened at the hands of Ferguson.

"Can't you ring the hospital and ask for an update?" She waited for a response from the doctor. "Oi, anyone home?"

"I've told you, there's no news." She replied almost shouting, not hiding the fact that she was growing tired of listening to Bea whine and ask for information.

Bea was tired, exhausted in fact. Sick of asking the same questions and getting no answers. The only one that ever spoke to her and gave her any information in this place was Will, but he was no where to be signed and apparently the doctor isn't his PA and can't contact him. So when Bridget walked in offering a reassuring voice and saying that Will wasn't far behind she let some of the air back out of her lungs. She left after telling bea to call out if she needed anything, but Bea being herself probably completely dismissed that.

Will walked in shortly after and be protested about being in handcuffs and as soon as she was took out of them, she spilled about how this all happened at the hands of Ferguson.

"Why would she do that?" He asked with a complete look of confusion on his face.

"Why do you think? Because I'm testifying against her." She retorted quickly, as if she had just figured out the whole of Ferguson's plan.

Bea had no proof but she knew that this was bigger than just a hotshot inside the prison and Ferguson had no plans to come back. She had planned something for the outside and she just needed to convince Will of this. She just needed one person to listen to her.

"I think that I can stop her."

"How?" He questioned.

"I just need to make one phone call, please." She begged but was met with being confined to medical and left again with an absence of hope.

She sat for hours, hopeless on the side of the bed in medical trying to figure out a way to do something, anything that would get some justice for Allie. Honestly, she felt like she was about to go insane. She had no idea what Will was doing when he walked back through the door of the medical room.

"This is contraband, make sure you get rid of it before you get back to your unit please. One call right?" Will said with the weakest smile as her placed the tiny black device in Bea's hand. He'd always done anything he could to help Bea, he always bent the rules as much as he could to see her not so stressed out or upset. Really, it was no surprise that he'd do this for her too. She was so thankful for the tiny gesture, maybe now she could do something.

She pulled the white sheet of the medical room bed over her head as she hid under the it and dialed Franky's number. The response was almost immediate.

"Franky, it's Bea. Fergusons left for court but there's something going down."

"You sure?"

"She tried to kill Allie. She admitted to it. She thinks she's not coming back."

"Shit! Shane didn't turn up for community service today, I've been trying to get a hold of him."

"Fuck Ferguson she's bullshit. I'm so sick of her Franky. This had nothing to do with Allie."

"I know. Look I'm gonna try and find Shane and see if he's got any answers. I'm sorry Red, hang in there. I'll call you back as soon as I've got something"

"Yeah alright, later Franky." The phone call disconnected and Bea had a tiny glimmer of hope. She knew Franky would do absolutely anything to help her out in a situation like this and that's what she adored so much. She'd never had a friend like franky before, she just got it and it was as easy as that. Not even a minute passed before the phone lit up.

"Listen, He's not at Ferguson's house I reckon he's at the court."

"Franky you need to go to the police and tell them everything."

"Na, I can't do that to him he hasn't done anything."

"We don't know what him or Fergusons up to. Who knows what she's been telling him."

"I'm gonna find him. You wait. I'll Call. I can't tell the police shit Red."

"Fran-" The phone call cut off before Bea could say another word and she was stuck in limbo again, not knowing what was going on. She hated not knowing what was happening especially when there was nothing she could do about it.

She did exactly what Franky said, she waited. For about thirty minutes until she was released back into H1 from medical. She paced back and forth in the cell block answering all the questions about updates for Allie. Only smiling when Maxine reported that she was going for an appointment at the hospital later in the day and that she would try and get a visit. Apart from that there was nothing.

The need for sleep was fast, after the minor concussion from the fight with Kaz and staying awake all night worrying about Allie, Bea decided to go to her cell and rest. She really needed to sleep because at this point, there was literally nothing more she could do but wait.

She fell into a sleep with Allie's jumper clutched in her hands against her chest. She's going to be okay she kept telling herself as she was enveloped in sleep.

Bea woke up to a buzz on the small black mobile. A text from franky appeared. 'Sorted Shane, see you soon Red. Franky xx'. One less thing to worry about she thought, but this didn't mean anything for Allie. Bea wished she had a bit more sleep, all of this was exhausting, mostly emotionally.

She skipped lunch, for the thought of food alone just made her stomach turn. Instead she stayed in her cell and rang the hospital Allie was staying at.

"Hey, I'm ringing for an update on a patient named Allie Novak. She's my sister." As soon as the words fell out of her mouth the phone cut off with insufficient funds. The only thing getting her through this was knowing she was seeing Franky in under an hour at visitation.

The hour passed fast and before she knew it she was sat in front of Franky. Twiddling thumbs and all, she was anxious, aggravated but mostly frustrated.

"Shane was a back up plan, the real hit was for someone else. It was too risky trusting a kid even for Ferguson and everyone whos crossed her, we're all in danger."

"She's already started."

"From what you told me, Allie sounds like a real fighter."

"Yeah, she is. You'd like her."

"Don't give up on her, ok?" Franky pushes because she knows how lost Bea is without Allie. It's so evident that Bea feels so close to her end.

"Na. No. She's.. She's, I've never felt like this before. It's nice." She confides in Franky, and she feels warm. She really has never felt like this before.

"Bea, I need you to come with me." Mr Jackson interrupted.

"Why?" She questioned with the most worried look on her face.

"We should talk somewhere else." She knew almost instantly that there was bad news and she just didn't want to hear it now.

"Just tell me." She pleaded knowing that if Franky was still in the room the bad new would be less of a hit.

"There's news from the hospital. I've arranged a call with Miss Miles." The sickly feeling from hours ago returned with vengeance. She'd never felt like she had this much to lose before.

The walk to the telephone felt like she was approaching an imminent death. She could feel her stomach tightening. There was a serenity to the whole ordeal, the phone call in particular. She'd finally know what was happening with Allie and that comforted her. It's all going to be okay she told herself as she sat on the chair, staring blankly at the walls as her hands wrapped around the phone.

"They've let us in to see her." Maxine offered the words with a tenderness trying to reach through the phone with care for Bea.

"Can she hear me?" Beas asked the desperation leaking from her ripened lips and straight through the phone to an unconscious Allie on the other end.

"Yeah." Maxine offered sounding hopeless as she pushed the phone towards Novak's ear.

"Allie it's me. Beautiful, you can wake up now, okay? You're stronger than this, you know that. Right, you stop messing around and wake up okay. Just wake up. Please, wake up." There was enough despair in the redheads voice to fill the entire hospital. Bea had lost people. She lost her daughter Debbie but that was so different to Allie. Allie was beyond everything Bea could've ever dreamt up. Her hand could not drawn a picture as beautiful as Allie was to her. She needed her desperately.

"She's developed this thing called acute respiratory syndrome. She can't breathe on her own."

"What, what are you saying?"

"I'm so sorry Bea there's nothing the doctors can do. I'm gonna put Miss Miles on the phone okay love?"

Bea's sobs were immediate. She was losing Allie. The world was falling into reverse and the stars had exploded. There was no colour anymore. She could feel herself starting to float and she realised that Allie had became some sort of gravitational pull. Allie kept her together, she was light and warm and so full of life. Bea needed that, she needed someone so far away from the seriousness she'd always lived in. She needed Allie.

"Smith. I've spoken to the governor and we've arranged for you to come and visit Novak. Mr Jackson has volunteered to accompany you."

"I.. Thank you." She retorted completely speechless.

The phone line fell silent as she looked to Mr Jackson for guidance.

"C'mon Smith. You need to sign this form so I can give it to the governor and then we're good to go."

The shakes in her hand were so violent that she had to concentrate with all her will to not create a scribble. She laughed for the first time all day. Trust me to be so nervous to see Allie that I can't even sign my own name she thought.

The whole journey to the hospital was a blur. She was just thankful that she wasn't in cuffs the entire time. Her thoughts were to lost to the idea of seeing her beautiful girl, even though it may be the last time. She felt warm, completely warm for the first time in twenty four hours and she wasn't going to let herself think of the bad just yet. Allie deserved better than that, she deserved smiles. She deserved the warmth.

They approached the hospital bedroom and Bea stopped at a stand still. Not even remembering when they got out the car and went up two flights of stairs and into the corridor on the left. She couldn't even remember signing her name on the visitors forms when she entered the ward. She couldn't remember and she didn't care at all. The memories were unwanted, she just wanted to remember Allie.

She was walking again now, fast approaching the room where her girlfriend slept. She heard Will talking to a nurse but she didn't pay no mind as they walked pass the threshold.

"I'll leave you to it." Will said with a weak smile. He really felt for Bea. He lost the love of his life and he knows that Bea's love for Allie was a lot more than his ever was.

Bea scrambled to Allie's bed side and without a second thought placed her girlfriends hand inside of hers. She could feel it. Allie was still here, and she didn't know how long for. She didn't know how long she had. The tears fell straight onto Bea's lap. She didn't want to have to say goodbye to Allie, not like this anyway. Allie deserved better. She deserved more than hospital walls and a hospital bed.

Her girlfriend was pale and weak. The heart machine beeped in perfect syncopation with the oxygen tanks. She counted them, and stopped when she got to twenty. The thought of Allie's voice saying she couldn't have cared if she had of gotten 20 years because she loved Bea that much. Bea knew Allie loved her so much and she never ran away from it. Bea deserved all of the love Allie had to give her and she accepted it with a happy heart. A happy heart she thought. Allie was her happy heart.

Her voice started to crack as she began to speak. "It's gonna be okay. You just fly. You be free. You go and find Debbie and you look after her. And you wait for me, you wait." She said as she planted a kiss on Allie's cold hand.

Allie was exhausted. She looked almost angelic as she lay on the hospital bed. Bea knew that this was it. That Allie had no more fight left. She had to let her go now.

With the tears pricking at her eyes, she made a final attempt to give Allie something. She searched the room for a pencil and some paper. When she found them she forced her hand to stay steady. Her tears fell onto the page one after the other around the pencil lead lines. Bea didn't know self expression much beyond art. She wanted to give Allie everything she knew. The frustration of ultimately losing Allie made her want to snap the pencil and throw it at the walls but Allie deserved this at the least. She deserved everything a person could give and right now, in the hospital room this was everything Bea could give her. She finished and a last tear fell onto the page as she folded into a tiny rectangle and pushed it into Allie's cold hand once again.

"Hold it tight and never let it go beautiful girl. You deserve the world and more and if there was ever a way I could give you that I promise you I would."

Honestly, if Allie could see her now, Bea knew she'd laugh at her. She'd also respond with comments that let Bea know where she stood. Bea couldn't help but laugh through her tears. Allie was always so knowing. She knew from the go that Bea wanted her and at first she found that a bit irritating but now, now she wishes she didn't waste a moment being irritated at all.

"Thank you Allie. You breathed the life back into me. I was so down before you, you gave me so many reasons to live. You were my reason. You will always be my reason."

Bea couldn't get anymore words out for the tears were literally choking her at this point. Every single limb was warm just because her eyes were fixated on her girlfriend. She knew she had to let go, she just didn't know how. She had given Allie everything that she ever had to give someone.

She pulled herself toward her blonde girlfriend who lay lifeless on the bed. Her lips hovered above Allies for a few seconds as she took her facial features in one last time. A single tear fell onto her girlfriends cheek and she quickly wiped it off. She could feel how cold Allie was. The last time Allie was cold she offered her a blanket and a jumper. Allie may have replied saying that she looked better with less clothes on and Bea could never argue with that.

She wanted more than anything to see Allie's blue eyes one last time. She wanted one last reciprocated kiss.

Bea drew her breath into her mouth, before she placed her lips on Allie's. Fucking stupid tube she thought. As quickly as she thought it, she banished the idea. She loved the tube for it kept Allie alive long enough for her to her to her. Her lips were but still soft. She'd never forget a soft pair of lips like this. The tears became almost river like now. Bea pulled her hands up onto her girlfriends cheeks and pressed their lips together for once last time.

"You are my sunshine, my only sunshine." She began to whisper with her lips close to Allie's ear.

"You make me happy when skies are grey. You'll never know dear how much I like you. " Allie hated it when Bea sang this to her. She'd always laugh and wink when she got to the part where you're supposed to say love but Bea always said like. Bea was always too precise with her wording to let anything else come out.

She tried to steady her breathing as she came to the last line. The gust of wind pushed her lungs to the very back of her ribcage. The lump in her throat growing so big that she didn't think she could get the words out. For Allie she thought.

"So please don't take my sunshine away." But she knew it. Her sunshine was being taken away from her now and there was nothing she could do to stop it. Through chokes and voice cracks she sang the final line. She waited in the silence waiting for Allie's usual 'So you like me huh?' shortly followed by the 'I totally knew you didn't want me to leave' response.

One more time, she just wanted to hear the innocence in her voice fill the room one more time. She would have given anything to hear Allie tell her she loved her. She wanted it whole heartedly and purely. Not on drugs or in the middle of a fight. She could understand now why though. Allie was scared at the time that she was going to lose Bea. So she gave her love. Bea walked out of the shower room that day both disgusted at her drug use but with a warm heart because Allie loved her. She knew that it was more than a drugged up speech too.

One more kiss on Allie's cold soft lips. The final touch of her cheeks. The final tears of Bea's that would ever fall anywhere on Allie's body.

"I love you, beautiful girl." She said as she barely parted their lips in an ultimate attempt to give Allie all she deserved. Allie deserved love. And Bea did love her. Bea was so in love with Allie that she was petrified at the idea of life without her. She loved Allie enough to go numb without her. Bea loved Allie and that was all Allie ever wanted.

It took every ounce of strength she had left in every single one of her cells in her body to pull herself away and head for the door. You see, Bea was always aware that life was short, but for the first time ever she realised just how big life was as it almost made the slight strength in her knees crack right then. Once at the door, she turned her head back to Allie and for the first time, she really felt it. She didn't have any idea how she was going to get through this and she didn't want to. Bea had always been independent, she never needed another person quite like this one. Her gaze was averted again, back to the door and she swallowed the tears and tried not to choke on the idea that she'd never see Allie again. She pushed open the door and looked at Mr Jackson with a reddened tear stained face. "Can we go now. I've said my good-."

Before she could get her words out the tears fell. Uncontrollably this time. She was on her own now, this was it. There'd be no more spontaneous rapping or an extra load of vegetables on her dinner tray. She'd miss that the most. The littlest things that Allie would do when she knew Bea was running a bit low on morale. Allie was a safe space, a security blanket but mostly home. She was a home for Bea. For someone that lived in a house with a man and her daughter for years, you'd think she was used to the feeling of home but she wasn't. For the first time since she met Novak, she watched the lights on her newfound home go out one by one. The front door was locked and there was no way Bea could get back in now.

"Yeah let's -"

He was cut off by the faintest voice in the background. Bea didn't know whether she was hearing things or not but that sounded a lot like her girlfriend.

"Seahorses? Nice. I knew you never wanted to get rid of me." Said the blonde as she wriggled slightly in pain with the weakest of voices.

"Oh fuck, Allie." Bea exclaimed as she ran to her bedside for the second time in under an hour.

"Oh and by the way Smith, I heard all that gay shit you've been saying to me. Honestly, I really wanted to laugh but kinda cant when you're unconscious." Her voice was hoarse and croaky. Not that Bea cared about that. Allie had woken up, by some miracle way bigger than the both of them.

"Oh fuck you." Bea laughed, wholeheartedly this time before she placed the first of many reciprocated kisses back onto her girlfriends lips.

"Maybe in a couple days." Allie joked with an attempted wink that made Bea laugh even harder.

Bea was in love, and it wasn't going anywhere anytime soon. Bea had her girlfriend right beside her where she always belonged. There was the warmth. The front door of her home was open and every single light was on. Allie wasn't going anywhere. Se'd always wait for Bea just as Bea would always wait for her and that was enough for the both of them. They loved each other so much that even in the eye of death, it is enough. It will always be enough.


End file.
